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On June 8, 1944, while at the 222nd Combat Crew Training School in Ardmore, Oklahoma, George Edwin (Ed) Farrar received combat duty orders requiring “regular and frequent participation in aerial flights.” Two weeks later he wrote a letter to his mother. He would leave the states in about a week, but still didn’t know where he would be permanently stationed.

June 22, 1944

Ardmore Army Air Base

Ardmore, Oklahoma

Dearest Mother,

Received your sweet letter this noon, and also the one from Gene [one of Ed’s younger brothers]. I enjoyed both very much. I don’t guess I’ll hear from you any-more from this station, but will send you my new address as soon as I learn it. There is a lot of talk that we are not going to England, as we thought, but will find out at our next station. We will be at the next place just long enough to get our plane. It should take from three to seven days. I’ll write you as often as I can, and I want you to know that I haven’t waited this long to start asking God to help me. That is one thing I have never been too proud to do, and I think it helps a lot, too.

There is one thing nice about not going to England, and that is we won’t run into as much flak anywhere else. All we will have to worry about is fighters, and we have damn good guns on our ships to take good care of them. That is why we fly more missions everywhere else. When we are not flying, we don’t have to turn our hands, and in less than a year I’ll be back with thirty days to spend at home. We may even finish by Christmas, as I am going to fly every mission I can, and finish up soon.

Well, I had better cut this here as we have a long hop in front of us. Will write again soon.